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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26520607">Heidrun - After the Fall</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calliopes_Quill/pseuds/Calliopes_Quill'>Calliopes_Quill</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dungeons &amp; Dragons (Roleplaying Game), Dungeons &amp; Dragons - All Media Types, Original Work</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alone, Angst, Depression, Fantasy, Magic, So much angst, Sorceress, cleric - Freeform, dnd character, i swear it gets better, im really proud of this though, loss of family, poor kid has been through so much, she's great, survivor's guilt, yes i wrote this about my dnd character</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 04:20:55</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,018</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26520607</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calliopes_Quill/pseuds/Calliopes_Quill</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>It wasn't supposed to be this way.<br/>She was supposed to just have a fun day out with her friends. Hang out in the woods outside of town. No rules, no watchful guards. Just her and her friends and some good-natured sparring.<br/>How could they have known the city would be attacked? That she could lose everything she knew in a matter of seconds.<br/>And now she was alone.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Heidrun - After the Fall</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Did I go on a writing binge and write 30+ pages of narrative-style backstory for my D&amp;D character?<br/>Yes. Yes I did. And I regret nothing.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  
  <span>Kaia awoke in what had once been a grand council chamber. Now it was a ruin, tiles cracked and melted, pierced and littered with pieces of the chambers above. Four stories of centuries-old timber and stone now opened to the sky. Kaia rolled stiffly onto her back, staring up at the sky with a numb sort of detachment as the events of the last day slowly came back to her. Going to meet her friends in the city. Sneaking out beyond the walls. The scouts. Fire bolts. The attack. Her family, dead. The twang of bowstrings. Her friends falling at her feet. And the white light that had swallowed her whole.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>She thought she was dead. By all rights she should have been. But aside from a bit of stiffness, she didn’t even feel any pain. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>It was wrong, all of it just so wrong. How could she be here if they were gone? How could the sun be shining, the birds singing in the sky, when her world was ending? She let out a choked sob, curling in on herself, arms wrapped tightly around her knees as if to keep herself from simply shaking apart. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>When she ran out of tears to cry, when the trembling finally stopped, the sun was high in the sky. Though she gave brief consideration to simply staying where she was until she joined her family in the afterlife, she knew that she couldn’t do that. They wouldn’t want that for her. So she had to stand. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>Grimly she pushed herself upright and took her first real look at what was left of her home. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>The destruction had been absolute. Of the castle that had once crowned the hill, there was nothing left but rubble, and the crumbling remains of the stone walls. Of the bodies of those who had perished there, nothing remained. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>She built cairns for each of them anyway, gathering fallen stones and pretty pieces of broken tile and shattered glass. One for each face that she had known, and one for all of those she hadn’t. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>It was almost nightfall when she said her final prayers over the stones. And then -- knuckles scraped, fingers blistered, and stomach growling -- it was time to consider practicalities. She had discovered the remains of the castle wells under piles of broken stone. The kitchens too had been decimated by the explosion, but a few of the cellars remained intact. She found no trace of flint, nor any other means of starting a fire. Of the bright spark of magic that had filled her before, there was barely an ember, and trying to coax it stronger left her with nothing but a headache. With no means to start a cookfire, there were few options available for food. The small meal of salt beef and a handful of mixed vegetables took the edge off her hunger. She could not afford to eat more until she knew for sure what remained of the food, and what she was going to do next. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>But curled up in the shadows of what had once been the library, wrapped in the tattered remnants of a velvet window draping and a century-old tapestry, one thought kept circling through her mind: She should not be here.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>The explosion that had decimated the castle had vaporized everyone inside, and from the look of the ruins she had been at the epicentre of the blast. So how in Cobal’s name had she survived? Unless… There was one possibility, one that nagged at her. One impossible possibility. What if she hadn’t been harmed in the explosion because she had been the one who caused it?</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>But that couldn’t be. She didn’t have that kind of power. Just because she’d managed to cast a few flame bolts in a time of extreme stress did not mean that she had the power to destroy the city. She thought of that moment, the shock and horror and despair, remembered the roaring in her ears, the rising within her before everything faded away.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>It couldn’t be. </span>
</p><p><br/>
<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
</p><p>
  
  <span>She slept later than she should have. Exhaustion, both physical and emotional, had taken their toll on her, so the sun was high in the sky when Kaia woke again. The torn scraps of cloth that she had wrapped herself in had provided little cushioning between her and the hard wooden floor, their weight barely protecting her from the night’s chill. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>She missed her bed.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>It was an absurd thought for such a time, but it was nonetheless true. She missed her bed. Her soft feather mattress and pretty blue quilt. The curtains that kept out the morning chill. She missed breakfast with her parents in the sunny family dining room. The crinkles around her father’s eyes when he smiled, the soft violet scent of her mother’s perfume. She missed the security of knowing what the day would bring. She didn’t know what to do now. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>Breakfast, she supposed. Or what she could get of it. And then she would see to her city.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>Of the buildings within a half-mile of the castle, nothing but rubble and shards of broken timber remained. She started to the east, to what had once been home to one of the city’s craftsmen’s districts. Evvy’s family had lived here, Kaia recalled. Her family home, her father’s workshop, was now a burned-out ruin, along with three of its’ neighbours. Of Evvy’s mother and father, Kaia found no trace. She could not say whether or not this was a blessing. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>It took days to recover the bodies. The streets outside were empty, littered with weapons and pieces of armour, shadows burned upon the walls, but nothing left of those who had owned them. But inside the buildings… well that was a different story. There were too many to bury individually, and of some she could find only pieces. The best that she could do was gather them together in mass pyres. Much as she would have preferred to bring each to the House of the Dead for their last rites, there were too many people, too many pieces left behind without any way to identify them. Block by block she lit each blaze with flint and oil from the abandoned houses, whispering prayers for the fallen. She wished she  had known all of their names. It would have been impossible. Heidrun had been a city of almost eighteen thousand people. So she said her goodbyes to the ones that she had known, heart heavy with the knowledge that this was all she could do for them.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>There were enemies alongside friends here, and Kaia made a point of keeping the invaders’ bodies separate from her people’s whenever she could. They should not have to share a pyre with their murderers. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>It seemed never-ending, but she continued street by street, quarter by quarter. Through the square where she met her friends whenever she could sneak away. Past the streets of Steel and Silk, and Bakery Row. Fires still smouldered in the lower city, the battered wooden buildings burned to the ground.  Even the university had not been spared, the heavy doors and white stone walls scarred by blade and scorch marks. An unfamiliar symbol had been carved into one of the inner doors -- perhaps a last-ditch effort to defend the school. But even their magic hadn’t saved them. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Walking through the now-empty halls was its own small nightmare. This was a place that was never meant to be empty. There had always been people when she’d come here, running between lectures, debating over some obscure bit of lore or precedent. Now there was nothing but the sound of glass cracking beneath her feet. The tall windows had been shattered inwards by the blast, and it seemed like anybody the light touched had simply burned away, leaving nothing but shadows and the floors and walls. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She wondered why the sight of the smoke, the blinding light that had decimated what remained in the city, had brought no aid. Then she wondered if there was anyone left to help. The invasion had been well-planned, she understood that much. An invading army would have been seen from miles away, but this...this came from nowhere. They had to have been infiltrating the city for days, even weeks. And what of the people in the farming villages outside the city walls? Had they been murdered too, to keep them from sending for aid?</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <em>
    <span>Why?</span>
  </em>
  <span> Over and over again, she kept coming back to that question. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Why destroy the city?</span>
  </em>
  <span> This had been no takeover attempt. No banners had been raised to declare the kingdom under new rule. No attempts to loot the treasury, or no credible one anyway. Even the university archives and the temple at the north side of the building had been left generally untouched. This had been butchery, plain and simple. And for what?</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>For that Kaia had no answer. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>She had no answers to a lot of things. Like what she was going to do next. By law the crown would now pass to her, unless she formally renounced it. The prospect of having to rule a kingdom one day had been hanging over her head like an axe for as long as she had been old enough to understand what that meant, but now that the choice was in front of her, she wasn’t sure she could give it up. It felt like a betrayal of all that her parents, her friends had given her, and all that she had lost. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  
  <span>She paused, glancing towards the altar of the temple chamber and the marble icon that stood behind it. The statue of Cobal, God of Knowledge and Prosperity, had watched over these halls for over three centuries, a symbol of inspiration and guidance for any who passed through the doors. The artist had depicted him as a sharp-featured Elven man of indeterminate age, gazing off into the distance as if deep in thought, a book and quill in hand. His face had always seemed kind to her, like that of a favoured teacher.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>    “What do I do?” She asked softly. Her voice seemed to echo in the empty room, but the god’s marble face remained impassive. “They’re gone. Everyone’s gone and I can’t -- I can’t do this.” She sunk to the floor, wrapping her arms around her knees. “What if — what if it happens again? What if —“  What if this was her fault?</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>    And even if it wasn’t, it still left her in the position of being the sole heir and being in no way ready to rule a kingdom. She was fourteen, for Illios’ sake! Far too young to have the weight of so many lives on her shoulders.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>    But Cobal did not have any answers for her. He was not that kind of God, who handed out simple solutions. In his teachings, the answers had no value unless you sought them yourself. That was not to say that no wisdom was true unless it was gained without assistance. That was arrogance and hubris, not wisdom. A truly wise person knew how to ask for help, and accept it when offered.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>    Which was, in a way, the very answer she had been looking for. Maybe she didn’t have the knowledge or the experience to rule, but she knew those who did. The remaining High Lords could advise her, fill in the gaps on that which she did not know. The closest to Heidrun was Lord Brennan fa Lys in Aerona, and that was several days’ ride away. Perhaps even now help was riding her way. They could send runners to the lords at Ivor and Berwyn Peak to tell them what happened and summon them to Aerona to discuss their next course of action.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>    Feeling much steadier now that she had something resembling a plan, Kaia pushed herself to her feet and brushed the dust from her clothes. Then, with a final bow towards the statue, she left the sanctuary.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>    It might have been her imagination, but in that moment she thought she saw him smile.</span>
</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>So that's episode one of Kaia's backstory done!</p><p>Would you be interested in reading more?</p><p>Would you be interested in hearing the actual game that she is part of?</p><p>Let me know in the comments!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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